52 Churches

I’m afraid I haven’t any pictures to accompany this story . . . which you’ll realize is a shame, momentarily.

Moose lie down in the snow.  They seem to lie down, if you can picture this, as if you had gone “moose tipping,” which is to say, on their sides.  When it snows, they leave “moose angels” in the snow, where you can quite clearly make out their body, heads, and rack.  It was the rack that helped me first identify the original moose angel I saw.

There was a moose angel just outside our gate on the county road the other morning.  I saw it as we drove by, since I was the passenger, and we slowed to look at it when we returned.  (Seeing a moose angel is almost as good as seeing the moose).  We pulled into our gate, and came around the first bend in our road, disrupting the moose who had laid down beside our flatbed.  He struggled to his feet, and Michael cut the engine to our Jeep.  We sat there, watching him for nearly half an hour.  Since he was up anyway, he decided to munch on the tree.  He kept looking at us, trying to figure out what the heck we were.  He had only half his antler, his right side antler was just a little stump.  I know they shed the rack, and I know they sometimes lose them in great clashes with other moose, but I’m not moosologist or anything, so I don’t know what happened to his.

Michael was about to fire up the car again, but I asked him not to, because the moose hates the sound of the diesel, and I was pretty sure he’d run up the hillside and disappear.  He ambled toward us.  He walked closer.   It was like a game of chicken, except we weren’t moving.  He kept stopping and looking at us.  Long, moosy stares, trying to figure out what we were.  Then he walked right alongside the car, his face and rack and body inches from Michael’s face.  He stopped and looked at Farmergirl.  None of us were moving.  None of us were breathing.

He walked a few yards past the car, stopped, and pee’d in the road.  Then we fired up the car, and he ambled off toward the gate.  Really, he hates the sound of the diesel engine.

It’s the second time I’ve seen the lop-sided moose.  I hope to see him again.  I sure do wish I’d had a camera as he got that close . . . it was breath-taking.

Douglas Spalding Hat. Glass lady bugs. Knitted Snail Finial.

This hat is hand knit from hand-dyed, handspun yarn, comprised of wool and silk threads and glass lady bugs that are spun into the yarn. I originally spun it as the Douglas Spalding Yarn from Fiber in the Hands of an Angry Spinner, when I was selling yarns.

All kinds of beneficial garden creatures in this hat.

I have kind of a fat head (just over 23″ at the crown), putting me at about a size 7 3/8 hat–which is still slightly smaller than Michael’s. It is a knit hat, with a tight rib, so it fits even Farmergirl’s head, which is only 21.5 inches.

The snail is knit from a pattern available at the lovely Mochimochiland.

There are a few knitted snails on the loose in our house, too.

(I’m just glad they don’t ooze on the keyboard like real snails).

Ralph, the snail, crawls across the top of this hat.

If you’re hot to have this hat, check my barter page, which lists things that I’d be willing to barter for.